Posted
by
BeauHDon Tuesday November 07, 2017 @05:00PM
from the odd-one-out dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: Today, Syria announced that it would sign the Paris climate agreement -- a landmark deal that commits almost 200 countries to reducing greenhouse gas emissions to fight global warming. With Nicaragua also joining the deal last month, the United States is now the only country in the world that opposes it. In June, President Donald Trump announced that the U.S. will withdraw from the Paris climate accord, unless it is renegotiated to be "fair" to the United States. But other countries in the deal, such as France, Germany, and Italy, said that's not possible. The Trump administration is also taking steps to roll back regulations passed under former President Barack Obama to achieve the emissions reduction goals set under the Paris deal. The U.S. is the second largest emitter of heat-trapping greenhouse gases in the world after China. "With Syria's decision, the relentless commitment of the global community to deliver on Paris is more evident than ever," Paula Caballero, director of the climate change program at the World Resources Institute, told the Times. "The U.S.'s stark isolation should give Trump reason to reconsider his ill-advised announcement and join the rest of the world in tackling climate change."

This is the problem with a President going out and creating legislation through Executive Orders. The next President that comes along can just as easily undo them with the swipe of a pen. This isn't something new to Obama or Trump, it's been done by multiple Presidents. If you want a law to stay a law, have it ratified by the LEGISLATIVE branch, not the EXECUTIVE branch.

I know the majority of voters in America can't even name the 3 branches much less describe their function, but a simple civics test at the polling booth could easily weed out those that should be allowed a vote in our Democracy versus those that should be sent to an American Idol polling booth and would never know the difference.

Well, the pendulum sure has swung the other way, hasn't it? Voters are now so low-information that we need to include the party of affiliation right there next to the candidate's name, and a single button to vote all one party. Because knowing even the slightest thing - even the most basic information - about the candidates before you step into the voting booth is too hard. But, you know, get out there and vote! Because for some reason!

Someone that wants to vote should have to take the same civics test that someone who wants to be a citizen has to take. Most would fail and then we wouldn't wind up with another "Clinton/Trump - Who do I hate the least?" election.

The Democrats have ardently opposed any sort of testing or requirements for any voters, asserting that any such test is inherently biased against minorities and the poor.

Hell, you have to show a DL to cash a check or buy a beer in the US, but Democrats insist it's not necessary to vote.

Personally, I'd be fine with making it the US citizenship test: there are 100 questions, you get asked random 10 of the 100. You only need to answer 6 of the 10 correctly to pass.https://www.uscis.gov/sites/de... [uscis.gov]

>The Democrats have ardently opposed any sort of testing or requirements for any voters, asserting that any such test is inherently biased against minorities and the poor.

First, remove the unnecessary first two words and replace them with 'Politicians'. It doesn't matter whether or not you're right, it's simply unnecessary in this discussion to draw partisan lines that will make people choose sides regardless of the underlying argument.

That's not the way executive orders work. Executive orders pertain to enforcement of laws that Congress has passed. The thing is in 230 years of legislating there are a lot of laws on the books, which in effect gives the president considerable leeway just by choosing which laws to focus on and why.

then we should follow their example, as they're clearly our moral superiors.

The US should be setting the example for Syria to follow, but we are not. Our current behavior is making Syria our moral superior, on at least this issue. We should all be embarrassed that EVERYONE including Syria, Yemen, Somalia, North Korea, and China, are doing the right thing, and the US is not.

We are the only country to have a reality TV star with neither any political experience nor any experience in international relations as our president . We are the laughing stock of the civilized world.

It is non-binding. However, that doesn't make it useless. It is not unusual to first pass a non-binding resolution, wait to see the effects and problems that arise, and then from the weaknesses pass a binding resolution that's learned from the previous mistakes. Now that said, the resolution was always meant to be non-binding but it was indeed changed quite a bit to allow the US to pass it without Senate approval.

So this isn't unusual in the steps that the nations are taking, but the truth being is that a multitude of nations were having difficulty with getting the respective governments on-board and so there were changes to the original plan, US especially. Did that ultimately change the underlying outcome? Well, we won't really know until after we're a few more years into it. But truth be told, yes it was changed to make it easier to subvert the Senate, however, it being non-binding was kind of the entire goal, the degree and legal basis had to be carefully selected to ensure passage in not only the US but in other countries that were hostile to the plan.

So if you need a sound bite: The Paris agreement was going to be non-binding to start with since that's a normal thing, but because of the level of hostility many nations different legal wording was required to ensure that nations who objected wouldn't have any clear path to objection, especially the US.

I can't stand folks that take such binary viewpoints of insanely complex international agreements. Non-binding agreements do have a point to them. I'm so sorry that human beings cannot in one sitting create a 100% perfect plan for how to change a broad cross section of global industry on massive scales on the first go.

I'm not even sure it's marketing. At best, it's just ignorance of what the deal entailed for us, and what it committed us to. At worst, which seems to be the trend, it's just glossing over the facts deliberately to fit an agenda.

Itâ(TM)s not symmetric. The obligations of the US are very different than those of Syria or any other country. Insulting individuals who take issue with that is just cruel marketing.

The United States was the only country to make concrete promises. There was no way to verify that other countries kept their vague promises. The US should reduce its pollution, but never enter into such a lop-sided "agreement".

Except, the government is actively trying to reduce/remove regulations on emissions. They didn't pull out of the agreement to reduce emissions on our own terms, they pulled out to not have to reduce emissions.

We are reducing emissions more than any other country by the increasing use of natural gas, and replacing coal-fired generating stations as the go obsolete (and NOT by gov't edict that causes a good generating station with a lot of service life to be wasted - Waste, that's what gov't does, always.) We're building wind and solar out the wazoo, although those efforts amount to still a tiny fraction of the more reliable sources of power of coal, oil, natural gas, hydro, and nuclear.

The United States was the only country to make concrete promises. There was no way to verify that other countries kept their vague promises.

Of course you have a citation for this? Because without one it's sounding an awful lot like Trumpbabble.

The US should reduce its pollution, but never enter into such a lop-sided "agreement".

The US produces a lop-sided amount of pollution right now, so any agreement will have lop-sided measures. The world is naturally lop-sided, so calling for absolute perfection or nothing is pretty lame.

"The obligations of the US are very different than those of Syria or any other country. "

It is not that the US hasn't been a major contributor in the past which lead to the level of CO2 we're at now and to the problem we're facing now. You want fair, the US would have to do way more than is in the Paris climate deal.

"Trump tried to renegotiate" He did? He formally approached the other members of the Paris Accord with an actual proposal? Someone in his administration actually said "we wish to renegotiate", outside of press releases or tweets?? If one looks at how the Agreement is designed, there is nothing to "renegotiate". All we have to do is submit a new “nationally determined contribution”, that's it. No negotiation required. For someone who claims to be "the best negotiator ever" who has a "a very good brain" he sure doesn't seem to understand the accord he just dropped us out of. Either he doesn't understand it, or is purposely being deceitful about all of this to play to his base.

The Paris Climate Agreement contains no enforcement mechanisms. That means it was created so countries could say they were doing something without having to actually do anything. We have been down this road before a couple times. So how is an unenforceable agreement going to "save the planet?" Its previous versions didn't.

Except a) POTUS has no power to commit the US to any monetary payments (not even Obama), b) any targets and/or monetary contributions are determined entirely by the country itself (i.e. Congress again), and c) there's no enforcement, so no legal commitment in any form. Your whole post is a straw man.

No, I'm firmly grounded in reality. But I do have a fantasy that I like to trot out and walk around. That fantasy is to see HIllary Clinton, Loretta Lynch, and Eric Holder being fitted for orange jump suits that say Federal Department of Corrections on the back. But that is just a fantasy and I know its is one. I know that none of them will do any time for any crimes they have done. But I can dream.

An trotting out the race card only cheapens your argument. I don't hate Obama because he is a democ

Nah, it's obvious that you and the US in general is just making cheap excuses. Donald Trump would certainly *not* sign a binding, enforcable climate deal either. If the US is not even willing to sign a declaration of intent, so much the worse for the US. What becomes of this formerly mighty country? The assclown of all nations, apparently.

So a single person says something negative about the paris climate deal and it's indictative of the site becoming "ignorant and stupid"? I certainly think not being in the climate deal is stupid but you branding the entire slashdot base as ignorant and stupid over a single comment you dont like is itself ignorant and stupid.

The OP has a point, it's gotten worse over the years. There used to be a lot more sane, scientifically literate and overall reasonable US conservatives on Slashdot. Despite being a European genuine liberal - not what is called "liberal" in the US, I'm way more liberal and conservative-democratic than that -, I used to very much enjoy the input of people who had different, more conservative and more US-centered viewpoints. Now we mostly get trash, it's as if the majority of reasonable and educated people had been deafened, because a radical minority is shouting so loud.

Maybe some guys have just become defiant/spiteful/sulky because of hidden regret, though, and don't really mean it. That's my favorite theory.

Maybe the politicians and the religious aspect of politics sets others off, sometimes radically (now moreso than in the past), but it doesn't justify saying that pissing off the establishment and their supporters is a bad thing.

Frankly, aside from pissing off the establishment and their supporters I don't see him doing much wrong. He's not presidential? So be it. He pisses off his party and the democrats? So be it. The American people hired him to drain the swamp. That's going to piss a lot of people off.

Don't give me that shit about racism or treason or whatever. I've followed this from before the primaries. Trump wasn't a racist nor was he treasonous before the election and he isn't now. It is clear that the establishment (including the media) is attempting to run the presidency through extortion (ala, play ball or we'll impeach you).

I am from Australia and even our government sponsored ABC News run anti-Trump "opinion" and "analysis" articles daily on their news site http://www.abc.net.au/news/ [abc.net.au] and have done ever since he was elected. It is ridiculous and shows a complete bias on their part. I don't think there is any maliciousness involved, just a bunch of people involved in an echo chamber constantly reinforcing their group-think.

The ABC's Chris Uhlmann did the Trump G20 "tear down" a few months ago. He then toured the US blowing h

Yeah, yeah draining in the swamp. Good one. We hate the wealthy so let's elect a bunch of rich white guys with a life long track record of fucking over poor people to save us. How is that working out?

It is clear that the establishment...

The Establishment? What exactly is that? Because from here it looks like Trump is the Establishment. I mean it's rough playing victim when you know, you actually run the country. How long does Trump keep blaming others fro everything before he actually takes responsibility for something?

I would be interested in where you got this information from? Probably from the same place that predicted Hillary would win in a landslide.

It is not a prediction. The candidates that Donald Trump endorsed lost tonight by much bigger than expected margins. The elections are over and the votes have been counted. Even the Virginia House flipped from Republican to Democratic.

I would also like to see the data that you have that says Trump is an ineffective leader.

He hasn't been able to get a single bit of his landmark legislative agenda passed. The greatest deal-maker to have ever lived can't seem to cut a deal.

All of the polls...all of them, including the right-leaning ones, show Trump at his lowest approval ratings since he was elected. Here's a conservative website that has the news for you:

Yeah, don't start partying yet. From what I see all that is happening is democrats are ether getting reelected or more democrats are just replacing democrats. Not really a big win for democrats as the status quo doesn't change.

Don't knock yourselves out patting yourselves on the back. You won several minor elections in the grand scheme of things. After that spanking democrats took in 2016 it is expected that you would get some of your shit together a year later.

I mean lets be real. Virginia and Washington state where already blue in theory if not practice. Now that its official it just makes you a bigger target in 2018.

But 2018 is where it will matter. If Trump can convince voters to remove both republican and democrat

Yup, your TDS is in full swing. I bet you think that Trump is going to get impeached too. You should remove those blinders, take a step back, and take a good look around.

First fact. Hillary is never going to be president.

Second fact, Trump isn't going to get impeached.

Third fact. Despite the nonsense you just spouted Trump is doing a good job as president. He has some personally short comings that should be worked on but one you look past those you see he seems to have things well at hand.

Well since the obama legacy for the most part has been scrapped, the truth is we are not running on the obama legacy. Almost all of the economic upturns happened after Trump was elected, with a great deal of them taking place before he was sworn in. Hopefully, soon the obama nightmare will be a few notes in the history book.

Make no mistake about the ACA, its is almost done. Any real incentives to keep it have been done away with. It's only a matter of time before it is replaced with a better healthc

Some changes to the economy did happen during obama term. They happened at the ass end of it after we found out that Hilary lost. So they happened despite Obama, not because of him.

You should really stop trying to put your spin on what I said. Opting out isn't the same as losing insurance. Weather you or obama like it or not, there are some people that don't want to pay for health insurance. It is not the governments job to force them to do so. Once that burden has been lift, I think it already has,

So - your argument isn't that it transfers $100 billion to foreign Governments, but rather transfers $100 billion to large corporations who then donate $100 billion worth of goods and services to foreign Governments?

Because transitioning the USA's energy sources to renewables does benefit the USA?

Coal is dying, not because of "regulations", but because it is being out-competed by solar and wind. Why promote a dirty, polluting energy source that is dangerous to human life on earth over cheaper, non-polluting sources?

It's always fun to be called out by ignorant fuckwits who want to push an agenda, but the facts are not on their side:https://www.technologyreview.c... [technologyreview.com]"The inflection point has already been reached in the West, and by 2021 solar will be cheaper than coal in China."

Yes, fracking has historically been the reason coal is going away, but renewable sources are now adding to that."Those milestones will surely lead to greater adoption of clean energy. And the report predicts that of the $10.2 trillion expected to be invested into power generation between now and 2040, 72 percent will be channeled into renewables."

So why should we sign on to something that does not benefit us, or is even "fair"?

I would argue that it does benefit you. The USA doesn't exist in a dome, it is subject to the same climate change the rest of the planet is along with all the downsides that come with that. If things continue as they are you can expect worse winters in northern US States, far more hurricanes and tornados in the south/east, more wild fires in California as well as flooding throughout the entire country along with the loss of property and life that comes with that.

He's rejecting it because of what it is not. It is NOT a solution to global climate change. His predecessor is irrelevant, although it is convenient that he tried implementing a treaty commitment without going through the constitutional process required.

Does anyone believe that a single policy will stop global climate change?

The Paris Climate Accord was a step in the right direction. If Trump wants to say he's taking a different step in that direction, fantastic. On the other hand, if he's saying that climate change is a Chinese conspiracy (or a normal fluctuation, or due to solar flares, etc.), that's another matter.

Does anyone believe that a single policy will stop global climate change?

Does anyone believe that the colloquial English phrase "a solution to" always means "a complete and final, irrevocable, perfect solution to..."? When something solves nothing, it is quite sufficient to dismiss it by saying that it is not a solution to whatever.

The most common way is when the president signs a treaty which he has the authority to carry out, without involvement of Congress. This is called a "Sole Executive Treaty".

US Constitution, Article II, Section 2, paragraph 2:

2: He shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur;

Treaties require the consent of the Senate with a two-thirds approval. This "Sole Executive Treaty" you speak of is not constitutional.

He didn't have to go to Congress because the accord doesn't have any binding commitments.

Then the broohaahaa over the US "backing out" of this accord is moot, since there were no binding commitments to begin with. We didn't have to do nothing, so saying we ain't gonna do nothing is... well, seems like a rational statement to me. And all the states who are saying "we're going to abide by an agreement that doesn't require us to do anything" is pretty meaningless. I think the term is "virtue signaling."

The Chinese don't even have binding CO2 targets. The government of China are always getting special treatment because they pretend China is still a developing country. To hell with those "Climate Deals" that always leave China of the hook and always give them special treatment. As if their slave labour practices and their 25% tax on imports to mainland China doesn't give them enough unfair advantage.

"Chinaâ(TM)s CO2 emissions appear to have peaked more than a decade ahead of its Paris Agreement NDC commitment to peak its CO2 emissions before 2030. The latest analysis from the Climate Action Tracker indicates that CO2 emissions may, in fact, already have stopped increasing and reached peak levels.

The on-going reduction in coal use for the third year in a row has had a major impact... China has already surpassed solar PV deployment target for 2020, and has now doubled its PV target for 2020 in response..."

Their main criticism is that the NDC target is too low (50-70% below 2005 levels) and should be further reduced to meet the maximum 2C global temperature rise goal, which is likely to happen in the next 5 year plan.

In short, countries like China and India don't have to do a damn thing about their pollution for 10+ years, whereas the US and some other western nations have to cut all pollution massively and immediately, thus screwing their industries.

Further to that, if the western nations were able to do that, the TOTAL reduction in global pollution over those 13 years would be offset by the amount of pollution China and India emit in just one year or so. In other words, Ch

In other words, China and India, who produce 10 times the pollution, would be free to keep doing it while the rest of the world surrenders economically.

Dunno where you're getting your figures. I know 2015 was 2 years ago, but a quick google shows that in 2015 India and China combined had roughly 2.5 times the co2 output of the USA, not 10 times. Given that they have about 8 times the USA population betwee them, the average person from those 2 countries cause less than 1/3rd the amount of co2 an American does.

Why should WE convince YOU? Well, because you're polluting MY air and, hence, YOU MUST be punished; or we WILL HAVE TO stop buying ANYTHING FROM YOU because it will DESTROY the world my people will inherit.

Your answer shows your ignorance. We have a representative government. It's based on majority rules with minority rights. The majority *wants* to drive gas-guzzling SUVs and pretend like climate change is a Chinese hoax (or admit it's real and don't give a damn). I get it: you want to shriek at them. Do you really think that your all-capitals hollering will change anyone's mind or move the ball? Climate change and gun control have the same dynamic: the left shrieks and the right shrugs. I haven't seen any h

The question here is not whether you want to follow others jumping off a cliff. If there is a cliff, then everybody is going to jump, regardless of his opinion. If there is no cliff, then those who now warn about approaching it will first become silent and then be ridiculed a few decades later. If there is a cliff, then we'll see who's better off: Those who tried to stop approaching it, or those who prepared for a softer landing or some improvised flying device.

It's funny how obsessed those who currently explore space are with "not contaminating planets/moons with microbes from earth", but at the same time plan for settling on Mars.

Quite obviously, once you bring humans to Mars, you bring trillions of microbes along with them. And chances are that those microbes have a better chance of adapting to and pro-creating in their new environment than their hosts.

To me, it would seem much more reasonable to _first_ bring microbes to Mars, help them to get settled, and

Rejecting the AGW hypothesis has never been stated as a reason for rejecting the accords. Forcing US to pay for it while not forcing other nations, which pollute on the same level, to pay for it was the reason given.

When we look back at people from the medieval period pissing and shitting in the street right outside their house we laugh at how dumb they could have been, in the future (if anyone's left alive) they will look back at us and laugh at how dumb we are for polluting and destroying the environment we live in.

Either that, or, depending on what happenes between now and then, those humans living kind of of crowded in a small band around the equator may praise us as the ones who kept them from dying all out on a snowball earth [wikipedia.org].

Trump didn't deny climate change as these media outlets would have you believe, not as it relates to the climate accord. He simply reversed the Obama era commitment to pay billions of US tax dollars unless the powers that be agreed to a renegotiation. They rejected it.

Obama ran an end run around congress and committed the US to billions every year.

And where in the Paris Climate deal was the US required to pay into the Green Climate Fund?

In the end, China (a country that pollutes twice as much as the US) is allowed to continue to 2050 and will receive money from the fund. India, which is also heavily polluting will also be allowed to continue and even increase their pollution while still receiving payment from the fund.

As it should be, countries who are modernizing and have far lower per-capita emissions are given more slack than countries who have grown rich using up the planet's budget for carbon emissions.

The US is responsible for only a few percentage points more in pollution than the EU, yet the US would have to carry the largest burden. According to numerous sources the US has already met the goals set forth in the accord through renewable energies.

If you don't want to play catchup then don't slack, besides, if the fall of coal is giving you the reduction for free then what are you whining about?

Nothing is keeping the other countries from stepping up their commitment in order to meet the shortfall cause by the US pulling out.

Ah yes, the good ol' "I can exploit the system as much as I want because someone else will pick up the slack."

Comments like that make me hope that in 20 years the US finds itself on the receiving end of punitive sanctions for its inaction in response to global warming.